Vietnam’s first ethical elephant tours launch

Yok Don national park has stopped offering elephant rides and now encourages
travellers to see elephants in their natural habitat

Amid growing global condemnation of elephant riding as a tourist activity,
Yok Don national park in southern Vietnam has ended the practice and replaced
it with the first ethical elephant experience of its kind in the country.

The formally captive group of four elephants were released from their chains
earlier this month and no longer carry tourists on rides through the park.
Visitors can instead observe the animals roaming freely in their natural
habitat.

Previously, the Yok Don elephants, like many around the country, were
chained up for extended periods of time, often without access to water. They
were harnessed with heavy riding baskets, sometimes carrying tourists around
the park for nine hours a day.

The largest of Vietnam’s nature reserves, Yok Don is in southern Vietnam
near the Cambodian border, and is home to other wildlife, including leopards,
red wolves, muntjac deer, monkeys and snakes.

The park worked on the initiative with Animals Asia, which campaigns for
long-term changes in animal welfare and tourism in China and Vietnam. The
official agreement between the charity and the state-run park was signed on 13
July, and runs until April 2023, with the first tours taking place earlier this
month. Over the next five years, it is hoped that the new model will provide as
much or even more revenue for owners as riding, and encourage mahouts and
elephant tourism companies to follow suit.

“This project has entirely changed the lives of the elephants at the park
and it is also provides a much better experience for the tourists. Exploitation
has been replaced with respect, and if successful it’s a model we could see
spread across the country,” said Dionne Slagter, Animals Asia’s animal welfare
manager. “They all look so much healthier and are increasingly confident in how
far they roam.”

The group of retired elephants includes three females, Bun Kham, Y’Khun and
H’Non, and one bull, Thong Ngan. The elephants are also now able to form bonds
with one another, and are beginning to the display the naturally complex social
and emotional behaviour that herds would in the wild.

To help with the transition, UK charity Olsen Animal Trust provided funding
to to cover any initial losses, allowing the park to continue employing mahouts
and guides to help ensure safety.

Awareness of the negative effects of elephant riding has increased in recent
years, with a growing number of tourists avoiding cruel attractions and
supporting welfare centres and genuine sanctuaries instead, alongside an
increasing number of tour operators refusing to sell elephant treks that
include riding.

Many of the elephants used in riding and other activities, such as painting
or performing tricks, will have been caught from the wild as babies, their
mothers often killed. Once captured, they often undergo intensive conditioning
known as “crushing the spirit”, where they are kept in tiny pens and beaten and
starved, sometimes for weeks.

In Vietnam, the number of elephants in the wild is estimated to be as low as
65 to 95, which conservationists say is not viable for survival. Numbers have
declined dramatically over the past few decades, from an estimated 2,000 in the
1980s. Vietnam’s elephant riding industry also made headlines in 2015, when
several animals died from exhaustion. Campaigners and charities hope to
continue to educate the industry around the world, and show how profitable
ethical elephant experiences, with retired and rescued animals, can be
instead.

Responsible Travel has said it will consider adding the new Yok Don tour to
their list of ethical elephant experiences – this would be the first in Vietnam
to be included.